How To Clean Your AR-15

Worried about corrosion or premature rusting on the barrel of your AR-15? You might not have to worry as much as you would think.

Other than the many attributes making the AR-15 a widely popular weapon, the fact that the weapon will shoot well, even with excessive debris build up, is up towards the top of the list.

Cleaning weapons can be an arduous and boring task, but it is essential to making sure your weapon will last you as long as it is meant to, and function properly when you need it to.

So, when it comes to cleaning your AR-15, there are a few tips, tricks, and techniques that will help you in this endeavor.

First, you need the upper receiver to be pivoted open, so we must remove the rear pin. Next you will remove the bolt carrier group and charging handle. When you have the bolt carrier group removed, you will want to break that down into its parts and make sure to clean these especially well, most operators even suggest submerging them into weapon cleaning solution to do the trick.

Kleenbore No. 10 Copper Cutter, #2-KLC10 is a great cleaning solution when you are running patches through the bore. It is also highly suggested to look into getting a rod guide for this particular part of the cleaning job. The guide will help get the debris out and hold onto the patches.

Once you run the Kleenbore through with the patches, you should follow it with a brush that is coated in the solvent, and let this soak for a couple of minutes before you run more patches through the bore.

Now that the parts of the bolt carrier group have been soaking for a little while, you can take those out one by one and clean then with a bronze brush.

At this point you might have noticed a carbon buildup on the base of the hole in the bolt carrier, where the bolt fits. To clean this off, you must use a carbon scraper to clean off this residue.

Once you have cleaned all the parts from the bolt carrier group, you can just let them air dry, while you start to tackle the other parts of your AR-15.

Next, you are going to soak a gas tube cleaner with a degreaser, and feed it through with needle nose pliers, doing this several times. Then take a dry swab and run it through, cleaning out the solvent.

Any operator knows that the most important part of any rifle is the bore, so in the beginning you ran wet patches through several times, so it should be getting close to being clean.

Once the bore is clean, you are going to separate the upper and lower receivers, and also remove the buffer and spring from the lower.

Spray them with an aerosol degreaser such as Outers Crud Cutter and let them air dry. Don’t forget to clean the upper receiver and barrel extension with this spray as well.

Use this same spray in the buffer tube along with the trigger area with the receiver inverted, and just let the solvent run out to help clear out any debris. Let this all air dry.

Spray light oil like Royal Purple Gun Oil or Rem Oil all over the trigger assembly, and either use compressed air to blow off excess or some operators just wipe down with a clean rag. Then reassemble the buffer and spring.

And there you have it, it might seem like a lot, but a clean and functioning weapon is well worth it.